June 10, 2000

June 10, 2000, 00:00:00

At last, the new menu system is finished ! Well, no keyboard shortcuts yet but I'll probably add them externally (you won't have to see the menu to be able to call a shortcut). It took me several hours of hard work to implement the wide menus feature, and I nearly got mad at my computer for crashing so much, but now it works 100% perfectly. Now I'll try to focus on the status bar, toolbar and hall of fame. Also, I'm going to add a series of new layouts, a new background and a new tileset to the next version, which will probably be called, eheh, Kyodai 12.00 -- I think the new interface itself is enough of a reason to do a major upgrade. You may also get a new song from Miguel Samiez in the process ! Eheh, can't wait ?

June 8, 2000

June 08, 2000, 00:00:00

Hi there. I received some good feedback from the beta 1, and I'm satisfied. I improved the menu system these last days, and it now works in 2D as well (yes, I'm keeping 2D support, don't worry ). The only things missing from the "normal menu" are the keyboard shortcuts and the multi-column system (wide menus). The rest is, well, much better than the original... Apart from that, many of you will be glad to learn that I've re-implemented the good old selection screen from v10.21 (only looking better now, with the cool texture). I also added the ability to change the window texture. You will have the choice. Globally, the only things left to do is : finish the new menu system, and change the status line, hall of fame and toolbar so that they can be viewed in fullscreen Voodoo mode. Expect a final version this month ! In the meantime I'll try to find some time to watch the new Babylon 5 tapes I received...

June 2, 2000

June 02, 2000, 00:00:00

As promised, here's a first beta version of Kyodai 11.66 (here, 1,5mb). It's far from being complete, and you'll notice a few problems in the main menu, but it's a beta of course. I like you'll appreciate it. If you have a Voodoo2, jump on it ! You'll absolutely love this new version. Otherwise, do as you wish... For the fun, you can put a picture in the Kyodai directory to be shown as the splash screen. Just call it "splash.jpg"... I'm also *very* interested in knowing if this new version works if you had problems with version 11.56. I don't see why it should, but then again, I didn't see any reason why v11.56 shouldn't work on ATI cards. Oh, by the way, some ATI users told me Kyodai works perfectly on their machine... Huhu.

June 1, 2000

June 01, 2000, 00:00:00

Hi. Just to let you know, I'm still looking for (any) ATI card to fix the problems. Apart from that, I have a few questions to ask. I don't want to make a poll, I'd rather post the questions here and wait for some of you to answer me by e-mail. - Do you want me to keep support for 2D in Kyodai ? I really need and want to remove it in the future. Today I've added some code to allow the use of a 3D card to show a 2D board. The only drawback is that if you don't have a 3D card, the game will be as slow as the software 3D mode. - I'm planning to remove definitely the current Windows menu. Do you agree with this ? The replacement menu is much better visually, with a cool texture in the background, and it can be viewed on Voodoo cards. The only problem for now is that I can't show it in pure 2D mode. Or I'll have to make some minor modifications to the 2D mode, possibly making it a bit slower. - Are you interested in "Select Background" and "Select Tileset" dialog boxes ? Same as for the Select Layout box. It would allow me to put only Favorite Backgrounds and Tilesets in the menu, making it easier for you to switch between your favorite pictures. I think that's all for now. I'll try to post a beta version before this week-end. Please note that it won't be a fully working version. Actually it works fine for me, but you may experience problems if you try all the options etc. Thanks for listening.

May 31, 2000

May 31, 2000, 00:00:00

Hello. Quick message today. This is simple : I'm looking for an ATI video card. An ATI 128 AGP card is preferred, although an ATI Rage Pro or Xpert or anything like that will do. This is because Kyodai 11.56 apparently doesn't work correctly on these cards, whereas version 11.42x used to run fine. I don't see where the problem could be, so I want to see it by myself. Thanks ! (PS : I could trade a license for a card)

May 30, 2000

May 30, 2000, 00:00:00

Hello. No news good news. I spent all this time working on improving Voodoo support. First of all, a great improvement : if you're playing in Voodoo mode, calling a window (layout selector, about box, file selector, etc) will no longer throw you out from Voodoo mode. The window will be displayed in fullscreen mode. Second great improvement : I've also written a completely new menu system, which emulates the "normal" Windows 98 menus, only it works on Voodoo cards and it shows the marble texture in the background. Plus, all of these windows and menus have a cool shadow effect. I also fixed several bugs (load/save game support, etc), and I'm doing my best to release a beta version later this week. Just give me some more time to get everything to work perfectly on my own machine...

May 19, 2000

May 19, 2000, 00:00:00

Hi there. Kyodai 11.56 is now available at ZDNet, and you can download it from the main page. It was finished 4 days ago and beta-tested in the mean-time. It works relatively well, and Voodoo support is pretty stable. Now I'm working hard on version 11.57, which might be coming next week. I don't know yet what the exact feature list will be...

May 16, 2000

May 16, 2000, 00:00:00

This is a sad day. I only learned today that John Nicholas, author of such wonderful tilesets as Ivory, China and Dreaming, had passed away last month. I don't know what else to say, but I wanted to post this small note.

May 14, 2000

May 14, 2000, 00:00:00

Yup, it's ready ! Get Kyodai 11.55 Beta 1 now ! (1,4mb) I've been working on it all this day, and tested and re-tested the Voodoo 2 mode. And it works ! Perfectly, I should even say. So, this is a must-download for all users of a Voodoo or Voodoo 2 video card. Please send me your feedback ! The more detailed it is, the better for me. If you don't own a Voodoo card, you'll see anyway a lot of improvements in this version, such as a 20% performance improvement on the solitaire game in 3D (and nearly 20% on the other games), the return of these good old animations in Clicks, Rivers and Slider, and a lot of bug fixes. This is a stand-alone download, you don't have to install another version of Kyodai before to use it. Please keep in mind, though, that it might still be buggy (this is why it's a beta release, not a full version). I'm counting on you not to send me flames if this new version ever happened to crash your machine... Although I think it won't.

May 14, 2000

May 14, 2000, 00:00:00

Hello. I've just uploaded a fixed version of Kyodai 11.55 Beta 1, which was posted yesterday. This fix simply adds a file I had forgotten to include in the original release, which caused a crash when starting the program. I hadn't thought of this problem because this file was in my Windows directory, so Kyodai acted like it had found the file. Sorry for this repost, but apart from that, the user feedback so far is very satisfying. Same URL as yesterday !